Long ago I asked (somewhat tongue-in-cheek) whether American Idol was an MMO.
Today, I see that NBC is working on turning their entire TV schedule into a massively multiplayer social game.
Q: What is Fan It?
A: Fan It is NBC.com’s affinity program where members are awarded points for participation and interaction. Members can choose to redeem these points for a variety of rewards and/or experiences.Q: How do I earn points?
A: There are two different ways to earn points: events and challenges. Events are the activities you do on the site and on the social networks you’ve linked to every day, such as leaving comments, watching videos, playing games, posting links or updating your status. Challenges require you to perform specific events within a specific amount of time and are typically worth more points. Click here for more information on how to earn points.— Fan It | Social Networking: Photos, Videos, Blogs | myNBC.
Of course, this has as much to do with traditional community management and traditional rewards points programs as with games. But note the prominent leaderboards, the featured members area on the home page, the badge system…
As with most social games, there’s an underlying viral agenda here, of course. But also as with social games, the marriage of fictional worlds that users care about with game mechanics and transparent sharing could be very powerful.
Now excuse me, I need to figure out what I need to do to get a Chuck badge…
6 Responses to “NBC turns their TV schedule into a game”
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That’s potentially quite brilliant. For decades, there have been complaints that TV shows with a small but rabid fanbase would have their shows cancelled too soon (Firefly’s the first example I can think of). Now NBC has a potentially great way to let viewers have a voice to say exactly which shows they like, whether or not they get the highest Nielsen ratings.
Interpretation: viewers flock to Youtube to watch Conan O´Brien and NBC desperately tries to pull them back by taking on a more interactive appearance…
The Gamepocalypse.
Remind me again, what’s TV?
It’s fascinating to see how the ability of fans to communicate with content developers, which has long been a unique aspect of computer game development, may finally be reaching even the dinosaur media.
NBC will now find itself trying to answer a question that game developers have been struggling with: do you make enhancements to your content based on what you think the hardcore fans want, or do you base your updates on what you think will attract new viewers?
There’s still a certain amount of schizophrenia on that question even in the game design world. EA’s browser game Lord of Ultima, for example, is a generic medieval-fantasy Facebook-like game with no visible connection to the classic Ultima world besides the trademarked name. It’s pretty clear that EA’s interest is not in serving Ultima fans, so their use of the name leaves the fans puzzled and vocally unhappy.
If EA can’t find a functional middle ground between serving old fans of the world-content and attracting new people with gameplay mechanics, what are the odds that one of the old media (NBC) will be able to do so?
Interesting times.
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